The Waldo Canyon Fire burns on the mountainside near U.S. Air Force Academy, Mountain Shadows and Peregrine neighborhoods, Tuesday evening. Photo by Devin Fisher

Press conferences at the Colorado Springs Incident Command center have had to handle many questions about the “lack” of involvement of the U.S. military in fighting the Waldo Canyon wildfire. There are several reasons why thousands of troops are not deploying to the fire lines. As the incident commander has stated, most have no training. In addition, as has also been pointed out, the military is the provider of last resort after all other options have been exhausted.
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The last Bloggers’ Roundtable allowed me to interview Air Force Lt. Col. Ronald Wilt and Master Sgt. Jeffrey Flight of the Air Force Reserve’s 302d Airlift Wing. They are the only Air Force unit configured for wildland firefighting, dropping fire retardant.

When Lt. Col Wilt is sitting around the O Club, I imagine he hears a lot of TINS [This Is No Shit] stories from pilots who fly planes that begin with the letter F, F-15, F-16, F-18. “There I was, over Baghdad…”

His answer, I would suspect, is to invite them along on one of his missions.

He flies a four engine turboprop, gross weight 140,000 on takeoff. He flies that plane into mountains and canyons, at 140 feet above the treetops. He copes with normal weather, winds from the terrain, smoke and heat from the fires, updrafts, down drafts, shears, all to drop 20% of his plane’s gross weight in 8 seconds on a target fire.

I would say that one trip like this would equal the TINS “over Baghdad” story, and he does it over and over during the summer.

Here’s the interview:

Air Force Aids California Firefighting